We met a man of a most gaunt and miserable appearance. A young man not more than thirty years of age. He had all the aspect of a penurious fellow. Dirty, unshaven, with soiled clothes and unwashed linen. He was coming along the lane with a rude tumbrel. This man was a thorough miser as ever existed. He lived totally alone. He suffered no woman to come about his house. If his clothes ever were washed they were done by himself, but he never bought an ounce of soap. He had bought a small property; a house and some adjoining crofts, where he lived. From this place he was called Tony of Todcrofts. This man was never known to part with money except to the tax-gatherer. If he wanted a board put on his cart, or a nail to keep it together, he bargained with the wheelwright or the blacksmith to pay them in peat. He baked his own oatcake, and paid the miller in peat for grinding his oats. He drank milk from his own cow, and made his own clogs, cut from his own alder. He contrived to purchase little, and what he did purchase he still paid for in peat. On the fells he cut peat all summer, making days of uncommon length; and in the autumn he drew it down with a sledge, and on one occasion, having no horse, he carried the sledge, every time he re-ascended the hills, upon his back. In a neighbouring dale we passed the farm called Barben-park, which we were informed had been held by the family occupying it, on a lease for three lives, now being in the last life; of which the rent is so low that the tenant has oftener, on the rent-day, to receive money, on account of taxes and rates, than to pay any away. The house struck us as one of the most wild and solitary places of abode we had ever seen. It stood on the fell side, and for many miles there appeared no other house, nor any trace of human workmanship, but a few ruinous limekilns. The inhabitants were represented as wild and rude as their location, yet rich, the hills all round being covered with their sheep, ponies, cattle, and geese, which seemed in a great measure to run wild, and increase in a state of complete nature. There were said to be bulls of great savageness amongst them--the bulls of Barben being as awfully famous here as the bulls of Bashan of old; and foxes which the farmers often turned out, and chased with all their men for miles along the hills. A gentleman who had been at this house described the people as living like ancient kings in the rude abundance of earthly plenty. In Wensleydale there is a large farmer who keeps up the primitive custom of two meals a day, from Candlemas to Martinmas, which is the depth of winter. They breakfast at ten o’clock on cold meat, ale, cheese, etc.; and do not go into the house again till six in the evening, by which time they have not only returned from the fields, but have seen all their cattle served for the night, and a hot dinner of meat, puddings, and other good things, awaits them and their servants, who sit eating and drinking till bed-time.